COMMUNICATION

SKILLS
(GEN 101)
BY: ABRAHAM L.
VANDERPUYE
LECTURE THREE:LANGUAGE SKILLS
There are four language skills also known as the four
modes of language. That is, listening, speaking,
reading and writing.
The four language skills can be compared in various
ways:
1) Oral vrs Written: i.e. listening and speaking form
oral language while reading and writing are written.
2) Primary vrs Secondary: listening and speaking are
developed informally at home in L1 while reading
and writing are formally taught and learnt in school.
3) Receptive vrs Productive: listening and reading help
us receive information/messages while speaking
and writing help us in producing information/
messages. Listening/reading are passive while
speaking/writing are active. That’s, decoding (L/R)
and encoding (S/W) language skills/modes
 LISTENING
Very often, we use listening and hearing as if they are
synonymous but they are different.
LISTENING: it is an active process of hearing. It involves
paying attention to sound and making meaning out of
the way the sound has been composed.
HEARING: it’s a passive physical activity by which sound
enters the ear- hits the tympanum and waves are sent
to the inner ear for the brain to recognise it as sound.
Hearing depends on the availability of enough sound
and, the physical and psychological function of the
auditory organ (ears).
We do not decide what we want to hear because it is
involuntary/passive. Listening sets in at the point we
make a deliberate/active effort to hear a sound for the
purposes of understanding/comprehension. Hearing is
therefore a basic and primary stage of listening.
Consequently, we listen to enable us react
appropriately to spoken materials or the sounds we
perceive.
 CONT’D
Hence, listening cannot take place without hearing.
How can one interpret a sound one has not heard or
perceived auditorily?
When we listen, we therefore make conscious efforts
to;
• hear some organised sounds
• Reflect on the sounds
• See or know what the sounds stand for or mean
• Keep the meaning (retention) or react to the sound.
Together with reading, listening is one of the two
linguistic ways by which we acquire information.
Factors that affect listening
• Time restriction: no repetition, can’t crosscheck
facts,
• Restricted accessibility to speaker/information:
listener therefore takes the best possible
information at a given time
 CONT’D
• Delivery speed of the speaker etc: listener has no
control over the delivery of the material and hence
has to adjust to the speed and volume of the
speaker.
Kinds of Listening: are based on the expectations/
objectives of the listener
• Listening for information or facts; sts, public
announcements, tv/radio, wk plc
• Listening to evaluate (trs in oral examinations); the
attitudes & experience of a person, the information a
person gives (facts), the delivery of the person
(organisation & language)
• Listening to empathise; to identify with or show
sympathy (your neighbour/friend). Listening to
please the speaker
• Listening for enjoyment; sound, rhythm & verbal art
 EFFECTIVE LISTENING
Listening is said to be effective when:
• We have the full and necessary meaning of a speech.
• We would be able to use the information or react to
it as expected
Importance (as students)
• Obtain knowledge (e.g from tr/lec)
• Obtain instructions (e.g at lectures, hostel etc)
• follow group discussions
• Engage in conversations etc
• Enhance our knowledge
• Know people holistically- their thoughts, feelings etc
STAGES OF EFFECTIVE LISTENING
Effective listening is a process and the ff are its
stages:
• Hearing (pre-understanding)
• Choosing what to hear (pre-understanding)
• Concentrating (pre-understanding)
• Understanding
• Recall/feedback/evalt’n (post-understanding)
EFFECTIVE LISTENER (steps)
• Avoid distraction (physically & psychologically)
• Accept speaker as being competent enough
• Listen to know but not to accept
• Be open/keep an open mind (anything is possible)
• Place value on material (what will I get/lose). This
helps you define your objectives and thus
enhances understanding and recall.
 READING
• It’s the process of decoding, interpreting or
making meaning from written symbols.
• It is the process of trying to understand a written
or printed language (i.e. words & sentences).
Reading Aloud: It could be done loudly (i.e.
vocalisation)
Silent Reading: silently without lip movement
Effective Reader: 3/4/5 hundred words per minute.
Importance/purpose for reading
• Seek deep understanding of a point
• Learn new things or access new information
• Get new insights into old knowledge
• Enjoy or amuse oneself
 CONT’D
• Crosscheck information
• Revision (sts)
• Maintain and enhance our vocabulary
• It enhances our spelling
• Know the demands of questions and instructions
(sts etc)
Techniques for reading/Reading Skills
• Scanning: this refers to the kind of reading we do
when searching for a specific information, word,
expression, figure etc in a text. E.g. When using the
dictionary etc
Effective scanning (steps)
• You must be looking for a specific information
• Be very fast
• Ignore everything else in the text and concentrate on
what you searching for.
• Scanning ends when you find the item
 SKIMMING
It’s a reading technique/skill that aims at
generating a general idea or understanding of
a text (but not the details). It is therefore a
way of rapid reading for understanding when
the total comprehension is not necessary. E.g.
Newspapers, magazine, books etc
Characteristics
• read the whole text very fast without
stopping at any difficult word, expression or
etc
• The gist of the story/text is your objective for
reading
• Concentrate on the skeletal facts/ideas but
not the details
 USEFULNESS/IMPORTANCE OF SKIMMING
• Saves time and aids easy revision
• Sharpens summary skills because one
learns to pick only salient information.
• Helps identify/pay attention to only salient
parts of the text.
• Aids imagination and inference because
with the little information gained, one is
expected to determine the meaning/focus
of the text.
• Increases anxiety and makes close/
intensive reading more active, enjoyable
and purposeful.
EFFECTIVE AIDS/STEPS TO SCANNING
& SKIMMING
• Concentrate very hard on the task to avoid
distraction to your thoughts.
• Be time conscious & bear in mind that you’re
supposed to read the text three/four times
faster than your usual reading speed.
• Have the proper mental attitude and avoid old
reading habits and attitudes or else you can’t
scan nor skim.
• Define the specific purpose/objective for
reading and limit yourself to it (not more).
• Practice daily in your private reading to
become effective and efficient at scanning
and skimming.
 CLOSE/INTENSIVE READING
This reading technique/skill aims at yielding full/
detailed meaning of the text. All aspects of the text
such as the words, punctuation, graphology,
paragraphing etc are therefore important in this
exercise.
Intensive reading therefore helps you;
• Master specific information
• Make out implied meaning
• Follow the writer’s argument closely
• Study and interpret data
How to understand a text/levels of understanding
1) Recognition of words: use dictionary when
necessary
2) Comprehension: when one is clear in the mind
about the ideas expressed in the text.
3) Interpretation: the ability and continuous effort to
rephrase and explain the text read.
 CONT’D
Interpretation also involves knowing how the various
parts of the text relate and how the text relates to the
outside world. The reader’s experience is important in
all of this.
EXTENSIVE READING
This involves reading for pleasure or to get one informed
rather than reading for a real study. In extensive
reading, it is enough to know the general theme and
major events in a text. Hence, it is also known as ‘light’
reading and very familiar with students of literature.
It’s faster than intensive reading and the reader has no
intention to capture all the details and facts of the text.
The information is usually dispensable but useful in
later life. It simply broadens ones knowledge (reading
wide). E.g. Newspapers, magazines etc
 FUNCTIONS/BENEFITS OF EXTENSIVE
• Recreation
READING
• Language development (skills): vocabulary, grammar,
spelling, fluent speaker, fast writer, good listener etc
• Information for general life
• Increases reading speed and rate of comprehension
READING FAULTS
• Vocalisation/Sub-vocalisation
• Pointing at words
• Fixity of gaze- reading one word at a time
• Regression (going back to re-read a sentence)
• Poor reading posture/positioning of reading material
• Reading in psychological stress (last minute reading)
• Reading to impress
• Inattention to punctuation, stress and intonation
 CONT’D
• Concentrating on details during initial reading
• Reading with constant speed
EFFECTIVE READING
• See more words at a time
• Flexible eye movement
• Vary reading speed
• Ability to run pencil under words from line to line
• Taking graphology, punctuation and intonation very
important
• Ability to relate the various parts of the text or to the
background information
• Use dictionary sparingly/only when its very
necessary
• Ability to do active reading
• Self motivation before reading
• Reading to understand but not to memorise
 THE SQ3R READING TECHNIQUE
• Survey: cover page, title page, table of
content, preface/foreword/introduction,
index, glossary, bibliography/references,
body of the text (headings, sub-headings
and layout)
• Questions: title, about the author, subject,
up-to-’dateness’ of the text
• Read: detailed (this would be your third
because of S and Q).
• Recall/Recite: ideas/facts in the text
• Review/revise: fill in memory gaps identified
during recall/recite stage
THANK

YOU